1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an adapter and a method of communication between the adapter and a disk cartridge drive. In particular, the present invention relates to a disk-cartridge-type adapter having the same shape as a 3.5-inch floppy disk (FPD) cartridge, for accommodating an IC card or a semiconductor memory for storing, for example, electronic money information. The adapter is inserted into a disk cartridge drive such as a 3.5-inch floppy disk drive (FDD) and is driven thereby. The present invention also relates to a method of communication between the adapter and the FDD.
2. Description of the Related Art
Disk-cartridge-type adapters are disclosed in, for example, a Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication (Kohyo) No. 6-509194 corresponding to U.S. Pat. No. 5,584,043, and a Japanese Examined Patent Publication (Kokoku) No. 7-86912 corresponding to U.S. Pat. No. 5,159,182. FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing one of the adapters disclosed therein. The adapter 1a has the same shape as a 3.5-inch FPD cartridge and incorporates a semiconductor memory 2a for storing, for example, electronic money data, a magnetic head 3, an opening 4 for making the head 3 face a magnetic head of an FDD (not shown), and a battery 5a for supplying power to the memory 2a.
The memory 2a employs the same data format as FPDs. The adapter 1a is inserted into the FDD so that data is transferred between the memory 2a and a data processor such as a personal computer through the FDD.
FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing another adapter disclosed in the publications. The adapter lb has the same shape as the 3.5-inch FPD cartridge and incorporates an IC card 2b for storing, for example, electronic money data, a microprocessor (MPU) 6, a magnetic head 3, an opening 4 for making the head 3 face a magnetic head of an FDD, and a battery (or a generator) 5b for supplying power to the IC card 2b and MPU 6.
The adapter 1b is inserted into the FDD so that data is transferred between the IC card 2b and a data processor such as a personal computer through the FDD and head 3. The MPU 6 converts data from the data processor into data to be written into the IC card 2b, and data from the IC card 2b into data to be transferred to the data processor.
Although the prior arts describe a communication interface between the adapters and FDDs, they describe nothing about data formats transferred between the adapters and FDDs. It is understood that the adapters of the prior arts employ the same data format as that employed by FPDs. The FPD data format involves many tracks in a radial direction and many (for example, nine) sectors in a circumferential direction. If all of these tracks and sectors are used for the adapters, an FDD's seek time, an adapter's data processing time, and a data transfer time between the FDD and the adapter will be excessively long.